


Some Might Say

by Crazybutsound



Category: Blur, Oasis (Band)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-08-29
Updated: 2004-08-29
Packaged: 2017-11-02 11:24:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/368444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crazybutsound/pseuds/Crazybutsound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Damon is fascinated by the one who’s supposed to be his archnemesis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Some Might Say

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place during the February 1995 NME Brat Awards in London. Inspired by the following pictures:
> 
>   
>  &

_Some might say that sunshine follows thunder  
Go and tell it to the man who cannot shine  
Some might say that we should never ponder  
On our thoughts today cos they will sway over time_

It’s like any other event, any other place he’s been to lately where people either scorn or shout their support. In the end it’s all the same: Damon’s tired of being pushed around.

He grew up confused, uprooted and thrown out of his element, but somehow thriving on the confusion, on the urgency born of it to understand, picture, show… he’s not trying to explain, though, not trying to deliver a message. Ultimately, he’s just trying to sing and he doesn’t know whether to be happy or sad that people seem to misunderstand. The country’s moving, changing, shaking off years of inertia and misery, trying to get a job, to get off the dole. Up and moving and maybe Damon believes. Or maybe he doesn’t. There are days when he thinks they’re making history, others when he knows history is just repeating itself and what’s the point then?

It’s the same old race but they lost a while ago. Noel said it better, explained it better, showed that dirt under your fingernails made you somehow more legitimate than soft spoken words ever could. Noel didn’t grow up confused, didn’t embrace confusion. Noel grew up angry and that’s showing, showing with every look he throws Damon’s way over beers and lines of coke. They might be almost equals now—though Liam likes to remind Damon that Blur lost the race to the throne—but they can’t be the same, can’t thrive on the same creative sources, can’t co-exist, it feels. Damon wonders if he’s the only one who senses the irony of this: a feud that was born from a shared will to break out of social shackles, to fight a system that’s overdue for a change.

When the show is finally over and the party can officially begin, Liam’s pretty much all partied out and even Damon doesn’t feel the edges of the world cutting through his consciousness as sharply as they did a few hours ago, before the backstage area started to flow with champagne and overpriced beer. People were already making deals in the toilets over generous lines before the first award had been handed over and now Damon wonders what it’ll take to numb him out of his fear and inadequacy. He’s trying to blend in, trying to move effortlessly, floating from one group of reporters to another, clutching the price to himself, trying not to think about the fact that last year they had four of these little buggers and they were kings. 

Liam’s the king, tonight, fucked up and flamboyant, loud and as vulgar as Britain loves him to be, half high on alcohol and drugs and half on his own popularity. Damon watches and understands clearly the bitter taste of defeat, of never being able to shed his skin and embrace the outrageousness of the rock star life, though he did for a while, Top of the Pops and nervous cockiness about being better, pushing things until they wouldn’t come to anything else but disappointment and rejection. 

Damon knows his own faults, knows that he let Blur be swept up and prepared for war believing in a just cause that really isn’t a cause at all. There are no causes worth fighting for in music, it’s just something you need to need, and Damon needs and craves as much as the Gallagher brothers do, even if he doesn’t understand them, doesn’t know how to be like them… to be them. 

Not that he wants to, because he doesn’t, doesn’t long for the brilliant burning decay that clings to Liam’s every move, that even Noel can’t quite shake off, that looks inevitable no matter how high on the wave they’re currently riding.

The obligatory photo line-up the reporters are now crying for is all the more unbearable, all the more difficult to handle when Damon finds himself thrown in next to Liam, and he tries to smile, all teeth and shiny shiny eyes in the flashing swirling lights. The world isn’t standing any stiller than Liam is, swaying and bumping, pushing Damon off and to the side, out of the shoot, out of the way.

Damon doesn’t know what possesses him to push back, to try and reason and talk when it’s obvious that out of all the stoned faces surrounding him, Liam’s is by far the most fucked up one, all pupils and drooping lids, slurring the words to _Live Forever_ while sucking on the award’s raised finger, picture perfect obscene pop icon that he is and Damon can’t quite be. Damon speaks softly, maybe a little slurred, too, and he braces himself for more rejection and abuse.

“Oi! Liam, stand still, stop dancing.”

Liam turns and predictably crowds him, gets all up in Damon’s face, beer heavy on his breath and eyes dark and dangerous.

“No. So… are you gonna tell me that shit? Are ya?”

Damon is taken aback, surprised and more confused, slow to respond to the taunt, not sure what it is that Liam is expecting if it isn’t a lecture about image and talent and wasting it. Damon wasn’t prepared for words, was almost ready for a punch, a harder shove and the opportunity for a fight even if he isn’t the fighting type… but this…

“No.”

The room isn’t silent, even though Damon knows that most reporters have turned intent eyes and ears their way. Liam of course has a lot more to say, to spit in Damon’s face, strange mix of scorn and eagerness in his voice as he replies, still pushing Damon back, crowding him further into the wall behind them.

“You’re full o’ shit. ‘Ere, ‘ere, ‘ere, no. I’ll tell ya. I’ll tell ya. To your face. Your band’s full of shit. Right. So I’m not gonna take a photo with ya.”

Damon thinks about that for a second, remembers again his face on TV, his eagerness to please and agree to push back the release of a single, to believe the world is coming to him served on a silver platter. Maybe… Maybe Liam does have a point, whether the rejection stings Damon or not. He shrugs, not even pretending that he doesn’t care any longer.

“Well that’s alright. That’s fair enough.”

He walks off, then, walks over to a darker corner to watch since he’s been denied yet again the right to shine in the flashlights with the dirty kings of Britpop. He settles in comforting shadows and watches as Noel confronts his brother, delivering a punch and a shove, sending Liam sprawling to the floor before turning around and searching the room for… for _him_ , it seems.

Noel may not look as vulgar, as decadent as his brother does, but he’s no less menacing and Damon cowers in his corner, trapped and dreading the moment when Noel will be up against him, will be pushing him back into the table as he is sure to do.

Noel doesn’t disappoint, walks right up to him and shoves, pushes, roughens and because the room is filled with bright spots and shadows and people too fucked up to notice anything, Damon is left alone, wincing at the sudden sharp pain in his hip as it connects with the corner of the table next to him.

“You’re such a little cunt, Albarn. You thought you were so much better than us, you thought you were the shit, but see, no one is. You’re not, my brother’s not. He’s a fucked up pop star and there’s nothing I can do about it, and you… you’re gonna whine more, pretty boy?”

Noel pushes harder, smirks when Damon gasps and winces again. Damon doesn’t understand where the sudden relief he feels at the stab of pain in his lower back comes from, doesn’t know why being cornered by someone who might as well want him dead is giving him such a thrill, such a sudden surge of energy through his system. He lifts his eyes and stares back, smiles heavy lidded and licks his lips, trying to show Noel he’s not so afraid of him after all, even though he’s pretty sure Noel could beat him to a pulp without breaking a sweat. Damon suddenly realizes that he’s been looking for a confrontation all evening. 

Maybe it wasn’t clear before, maybe Damon couldn’t even admit it to himself but he now recognizes the itch starting at the tips of his fingers as the urge to kick and snarl and give as good as he gets. The confusion that was clouding his brain minutes before lifts and there’s a short moment when it’s all just sudden heat and rage and Damon pushes back, throws himself heavily at Noel who doesn’t so much as falter.

Chest to chest and wrapped in shadows, Damon can feel his fist tightly closed around the obscene bronze cast trapped between them, low and painfully digging into his belly. He pants and gasps, tries to squirm away from the sudden iron grasp of Noel’s hand at his lower back. Noel is staring at him, eyes clouded over with something that Damon is afraid to recognize, his breath heavy with the sour smell of alcohol and weed and way too close, mingling with Damon’s own shortened gasps.

Noel’s voice is low and lewd, slurred almost as badly as his brother’s though maybe not for the same reasons and Damon shivers, unable to keep a whimper to escape his lips as Noel lifts his face closer.

“You’re a bloody pretty wanker but you aren’t too good for anybody, get it? We’re gonna go down and we’re all gonna go down, you, me, all of it and you’re not gonna be too good for the fall.”

And then Noel kisses him, short and harsh and burning, with teeth and sloppy tongue, all too fast for Damon to register. There’s the sting of a bruising lip, the tangy taste of blood in his mouth and the next thing he’s really aware of is of being crowded to Noel’s side, back in front of the eager journalists and photographers, blinding light in his eyes as Noel tightens his hold on him and growls “fuck this” before lowering his lips to wrap around the raised metal finger of Damon’s award.

It’s over as fast as it happens and Damon stares at Noel’s retreating back, cursing bad habits for blurring his life and his reality. There’s probably a song in there somewhere and he’ll get back to it someday, soon, before the end draws nearer. 

Damon turns, then, spots Liam still dancing in front of the press, still shouting abuse at every other person present and he makes his way over, cheeks and jaw painful from too much fake smiling. He pushes himself back into the empty spot next to Liam and doesn’t question himself this time when the words come out of him.

“Oi! Liam.”

“What? You don’t honestly want a picture with me, do you?”

“I don’t mind. I don’t care.” 

“Well I don’t really want one with you. I’m gonna have the arse and the balls to say so. Yeah, yeah. We’re trying to fucking sell records, man.”

As the flash goes off and blinds him, Damon smiles behind Liam’s back, because yes, in the end, it really only all comes down to that.


End file.
